Weigh-In Day

Today is weigh-in day and while I'm not down quite a whole pound from last week, it still feels good that the scale has moved.  Check out my weigh loss charts here.  My weight right now is 182.5 pounds and it's the lowest I've been in a while.  When I attempted weight loss this summer I did get to this point and even around 180.  When I see the 170s again then I will be celebrating!

Weirdly, a memory came up in my Facebook feed from 4 years ago.  It was about the ills of dieting and obsessing over food.  It was one woman's experience and she talked about our relationship to food and dieting and religion.  It was interesting.  If I was in a different frame of mind right now I might throw caution to the wind and say "forget the whole thing, I knew diets didn't work!".

But I'm in a different head space right now.

I don't feel that I am controlled by food or diets like I was at that point.  I'm not in a place where I'm exactly free, I'm just seeing things from multiple perspectives now.  It's not all black and white.  I see the benefits of Intuitive Eating, but also the harm it can bring.  When my body was all out of whack it intuitively wanted to stop for donuts and ice cream multiple times a week.  My body intuitively wanted to stock the freezer with Ben and Jerry's and grab McDonald's while I was out.  Intuitively, exercise was not something I craved so I didn't do it.  Some might say I didn't give it enough time, but I say my body was crying for some discipline.

Now I don't claim to have things down pat.   I do claim to have changed my attitude.  Two nights in a row I ate bacon pizza.  I really, really wanted it.  I knew that if I didn't have it I would spiral down a path of too much food that night.  I knew that even if I did that, the next day I would be ok, but I knew that it was ok to have bacon pizza sometimes.  So I did.  And guess what, I was ok.  This was not "intuitive".  It was merely giving into a craving.  And that's not a bad thing.  It's not good, but it's not bad.  It just is.

And here's the thing...

I ate in a more disciplined way the rest of the day.  I did not have a "heck with it" attitude.  I think that is the biggest thing, the key concept.   Yes, have your bacon pizza, but no, that doesn't mean you failed and no it doesn't mean dieting creates failures, and no it doesn't mean you should quit your diet and eat bacon pizza whenever the craving comes.  It just means that most of the time you should eat well and when that bacon pizza calls your name, sometimes you should have it.  Not all the time, but sometimes.

Give yourself the freedom to say yes, but also the freedom to say no.  You're in charge of your eating, no one else.